12/17/2025
If the holidays feel heavier than they used to, you’re not imagining it. I've been hearing this quit a bit this year from friends, clients and community members, and it matters to say it out loud.
This season asks your brain and body to do a lot at once: more socializing, more decision-making, more noise, more stimulation, more emotional labor, often layered on top of already-full lives and less rest. For our aging nervous systems that are also adapting to hormonal shifts, an different stages of healing and regenerating, that extra load can tip stress from manageable to overwhelming pretty quickly.
Here’s something that’s often missing from the conversation: your brain is wired for predictability and safety. The holidays, by nature, disrupt both. Routines get thrown off, sleep changes, meals look different, and long-standing family dynamics tend to resurface whether we want them to or not. Add financial pressure and the quiet expectation to feel joyful, grateful, and “together,” and it makes perfect sense if you feel more reactive, more tired, or more emotionally tender than you used to. Nothing has gone wrong — your system is simply responding to complexity. Your brain doesn't like change and it will resist changes in routine. It thinks that by doing this it is keeping you safe.
This is where I want to gently reframe things with you. Holiday stress isn’t a personal failure or a sign that you’re “not handling things well.” It’s your nervous system responding to overload. And because of that, wellness this season isn’t about doing more self-care, buying the right planner for the new year, or pushing yourself to keep up. It’s about reducing unnecessary strain. It’s about choosing regulation over perfection, permission over pressure, and small moments of steadiness over trying to make the season feel a certain way.
The simple truth to carry with you: you don’t need to fix yourself for the holidays you need to support your nervous system through them. Gentler is not giving up. Gentler is wisdom.
So I encourage you as we head into the last few weeks of the year to connect with yourself, take moments to breath, sit in nature, drink lots of water and step back to experience tiny bits of joy when you can. Give yourself permission to rest, to be quiet and to eat the food that brings you joy!
Happy Holidays everyone 💜